FOMC Stock Market: How Stocks Behave Around Meetings

On 18 December 2024 the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) lowered its target range for interest rates by 0.25 percentage point. The FOMC is the Federal Reserve's rate-setting committee. SPY (the S&P 500 exchange-traded fund, or ETF) fell 2.98% by the close.

That was the biggest decision-day move of the 22 FOMC meetings from 31 January 2024 to 16 September 2026. Decision day is the day the FOMC publishes its decision. This guide shows what SPY and three other funds did on each decision day and in the weeks after.

The FOMC meets eight times a year. Each scheduled meeting ends with a written statement at 2:00 pm Eastern time, with the Chair's press conference at 2:30 pm. The US stock market closes at 4:00 pm.

So the closing price on decision day includes about two hours of trading after the statement. It also includes the press conference.

We explain the dates in FOMC Meeting Schedule, the voters in What Is the FOMC? and the Fed's wider job in What Does the Fed Do?

The data cover the 22 scheduled meetings from 31 January 2024 to 16 September 2026. The FOMC held the target range at 15 of them, lowered it at 6 and raised it at 1.

Four funds stand for four markets. SPY follows the S&P 500, an index of large US companies. IWM (the Russell 2000 ETF) follows the Russell 2000, an index of small US companies.

TLT (the long-term US Treasury bond ETF) follows long-term US Treasury bonds. GLD (the gold ETF) follows the gold price.

Each fund has three returns. A trading day is a day the US stock market is open. The decision-day close is the closing price on decision day.

The two later windows start at the decision-day close, so they leave out the decision-day move. Their lengths follow the one-week and one-month returns in our data. Other lengths were tried only to check the definitions, not to look at results.

Results are medians unless the text says mean. The median is the middle result when the 22 are ranked. The mean is their total divided by 22.

Only SPY has a base rate here, from the S&P 500 index over all 659 trading days. We computed none for IWM, TLT or GLD, so their figures cannot be read as unusual.

The definitions above come from the code that produces these returns, confirmed on 15 October 2026. They were also tested against the S&P 500 index.

The SPY, IWM and TLT returns count dividends, from the day each payment comes out of the price. GLD pays no dividend, so its returns are price only.

The chart shows SPY's move on each of the 22 decision days, with the date under each bar. SPY fell on 14 and rose on 8. The median move was a fall of 0.07%.

Five of the six biggest moves were falls of more than 1.2%. The largest was 2.98% on 18 December 2024, when the range was cut. The only rise among them was 1.6% on 31 July 2024, when the range was held.

For comparison, the S&P 500 index rose on 56% of all trading days in the same period. A move of 1% or more in either direction came on 7 of the 22 decision days (32%), against 22% of all trading days.

The median size of a decision-day move, up or down, was 0.56%, against 0.50% on all trading days.

The chart compares SPY after the 22 meetings with the S&P 500 index on all 659 trading days from 31 January 2024 to 16 September 2026. Each of those days starts the same windows. The last 19-day window ends on 13 October 2026.

The index figures leave out dividends. SPY's 19-day returns run about 0.1 point above the index on average, which is the size of the dividends.

Four trading days after the decision-day close, SPY was higher after 13 of the 22 meetings (59%). The median gain was 1.10%. Across all periods, the S&P 500 was higher 61% of the time, with a median of 0.40%.

After 19 trading days, SPY was higher after 17 of the 22 meetings (77%), with a median of 2.11%. The S&P 500 was higher in 69% of all 19-day periods, with a median of 1.80%.

The S&P 500 drifted upward over these years, so the gains after meetings sit against a rising base rate.

Source: YX Insights

The table gives each fund's median return and, in brackets, the number of the 22 meetings with a gain. It describes what the funds did. It does not test whether any result was unusual, because only SPY has a base rate.

On 18 December 2024, IWM fell 4.43% against SPY's fall of 2.98%.

The chart plots SPY's return over the next 19 trading days after each meeting, grouped by decision. The median was 3.13% after the 15 holds, against 1.30% after the 6 cuts. The one rate rise, on 16 September 2026, was followed by a gain of 3.43%.

Those groups are too small to compare. The six cuts came in two runs, in September to December 2024 and September to December 2025. The rate rise is a single meeting.

The gap between the groups could come from the months in which the meetings fell.

The 22 meetings run from January 2024 to September 2026, one stretch of market history. A pattern needs many more.

The decision-day record is the strongest of the six chance tests we ran. Drawing 22 ordinary trading days at random from the same period would give 8 or fewer gains about 5 times in 100.

That counts the low tail only. Counting both tails it is about 8 to 10 in 100, depending on the method.

Two other results sit near the same line, counting one tail each. In random draws of 22 trading days, SPY's mean four-day gain was matched or beaten about 6 times in 100. Its mean decision-day fall was matched or exceeded about 9 times in 100.

We made 53 comparisons. They were 12 for the four funds over three windows, 3 against S&P 500 base rates, 2 for the size of moves, plus 36 splits by type of decision.

Six of them were tested against chance. Among that many, a 5-in-100 result is not surprising.

Other news also arrives in the 19 trading days after a meeting, such as jobs and inflation reports. The returns above do not separate the Fed's effect from everything else.

SPY's record around 22 Fed meetings is a range of outcomes. The sample cannot show a pattern in it.

This explainer is part of the YX Insights Academy. Each one takes a single idea and checks it against real data.

The same approach runs through everything else we publish:

Good places to start on the website:

Not reliably. From 31 January 2024 to 16 September 2026, SPY was higher four trading days after the decision-day close at 13 of 22 meetings. Nineteen trading days after, it was higher at 17 of 22, against 61% and 69% for the S&P 500 index over all comparable periods.

It fell more often than it rose in these 22 meetings. SPY fell on 14 of the 22 decision days from 31 January 2024 to 16 September 2026, with a median move of −0.07%. The S&P 500 index rose on 56% of all trading days, while 22 meetings are too few for a rule.

The FOMC publishes its statement at 2:00 pm US Eastern time, with the Chair's press conference at 2:30 pm. US stocks trade until 4:00 pm Eastern time, so decision-day closing prices include about two hours of trading after the statement. The FOMC meeting schedule gives the UK times.

The record is mixed. SPY rose on 3 of the 6 cut decision days and was higher 19 trading days later after 5 of the 6. The six cuts came in two runs, in 2024 and 2025, which is too few to say more.

The Federal Reserve says the FOMC holds eight regularly scheduled meetings during the year and other meetings as needed. The minutes of each regularly scheduled meeting follow three weeks after the decision. The FOMC meeting schedule lists the dates.

DISCLAIMER: This article is strictly educational. Any information or analysis in this note is not an offer to sell or the solicitation of an offer to buy any securities. Nothing in this note is intended to be investment advice and nor should it be relied upon to make investment decisions. Any opinions, analyses, or probabilities expressed in this note are those of the author as of the note's date of publication and are subject to change without notice.